Instagram

[PooleySpooley]

Teenagers and Instagram.

We pay for DSDs mobile phone and she has several Instagram accounts none of which are “monitored” as such by either parent (DH and his ex).

She is 14. My DD (who is 19) follows her and sometimes will show me her posts.

She posts a lot about self harm and suicide and has lost several friendships over sending texts threatening to drink bleach (said she was actually doing it when there was no bleach in the house/was here doing activities with us- so seemingly more “attention seeking” than real but she did have a mentor at school for a bit after one incident) and she posts a lot about being Gay being non binary, being gender neutral (I don’t really understand) and her parents saying she is too young to know her sexuality (DH certainly has said nothing of the sort to her and we have both said that we just want her to be happy and one of our other kids is openly Gay).

She posted a really disturbing photo with scissors round her neck at Halloween and regulars posts photos of herself sticking her fingers up, swearing etc.

Then (and this is a separate issue) she posted a load of photos of herself in our bedroom last time she was here, which has pissed me off as she had no business being in our bedroom and I feel it’s a massive boundary regarding our privacy and having our private space plastered all over the internet.

I just worry that she is making a bit of an idiot of herself on social media and clearly doesn’t have the maturity to be on there and DH needs to do something about it/support her mother to in order to protect her from herself. She knows she can talk to us if she has problems and I have spoken with her about social media not being the best place to air her angst.

Can employers etc see past Instagram posts - is there a way that DH could monitor it a bit more carefully?

You sound more concerned about the fact she's in your bedroom and future employment than you do her mental health? Regardless of if she's going to drink bleach or not the craving for attention is still an issue and possibly signals an underlying issue. You need to chat to her mother about it to see if she's aware and put a plan in place to tackle the behaviour as a team.

The tricky thing here is that if your DH or his ex delete the accounts (which I do feel needs to happen) and the app, she can always redownload it. Unsure whether it’s the same on android but on apple if you have previously had an app installed, you don’t need to put the password in to reinstall it iykwim. They definitely need to be keeping a closer eye on her internet activities and cracking down on this, strong words need to be had.

I would honestly consider buying her a cheaper phone so she can’t access Instagram.

Yes - clearly we have been concerned that there is an underlying issue!

She had the mentor as did not reach threshold for CAMHS and we have told her that we would pay for her to have counselling if she wanted (which she said she doesn’t) so we are helping her address her issues if there are any.

I am concerned about the plastering everything over social media on top of those things.

My concerns are regarding what she’s

@outpinked

I agree.

@chocolatebuttonsandcheese

I think it’s perfectly ok to care and have concerns for her and to be pissed off about her being in our room.

I have wanted to get her a cheaper phone anyway as she has lost and smashed so many and DH just replaces them